McKinley Dixon’s ‘Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?’ is a beautiful album that channels feelings of longing and escape

There’s a specific type of magic that only exists in Chicago. Lifelong Chicagoans know it intimately, but it may take new folks a few years to understand it. For rapper McKinley Dixon, who moved to the city’s Garfield Park neighborhood last spring from Richmond, Virginia, it only took until the sweltering heat of the summertime took hold for him to truly understand it. Dixon said it’s different from the Southern heat he was used to.

“The Southern summer sun is so, so long and warm and it holds you very much,” Dixon recalled. “But the people here in Chicago during the summer are active and it’s hot and it’s so great and so much magic.”

In a literal sense, Dixon means an actual sort of magic, an urban magical realism of people “running faster than cars” or disappearing into the street or performing sleight of hand. But Dixon also means a propulsive fuel only evident for a few months, but still the stuff of legend.

That inspiration helped drive the creative process for “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?,” Dixon’s fourth critically acclaimed record, released June 2 on City Slang Records. Featuring collaborators like poet Hanif Abdurraqib (who reads a Toni Morrison passage to open the record) and a richly crafted, jazz-inspired sound, “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?” is one of the most accomplished records of the year.

Dixon’s musical journey began as a means of trying to find his own identity growing up. Splitting his time between Annapolis, Maryland, and Queens, New York, helped shape his interests and tastes. Many things — musically speaking — were up for grabs, although Dixon didn’t necessarily love everything he listened to. It was the few diamonds in the rough (things like My Chemical Romance and Panic! At the Disco) that initially began to pique his interest.

“For me — I think for Black people — it was sort of this thing (where) we can put ourselves into this cinematic universe, this theatrical universe, because it’s not necessarily talking exactly about the person that we see,” he said.

He eventually discovered old-school hip hop, which fueled his love of strong lyricism, and punk, which introduced him to a DIY ethos. As a rapper with a live band, the punk scene became a welcoming environment for his eclectic musical compositions, compared with traditional rap show lineups. “I guess that I sort of combined all three of those, and that’s where I’m at now,” he said. “It took time obviously. The first album was never the best, but it was definitely the progression of it all.”

But Dixon cites the influence and strength of the Black queer and transgender communities, whose lived experiences are “in the trenches,” for creating his most significant growth as an artist.

“A lot of these young folks — like young Black queer, young Black trans folks — those are the ones that really (were) like, ‘This is our life. It’s serious. It’s on-site every single time because we really have no other option,’” Dixon recalled.

Most artists speak from a personal perspective, but Dixon is driven by a greater collective need. And while parts of himself are still peppered throughout “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?”, he’s also taken careful attention to incorporate a “we” and “us” perspective in his lyrics. The challenges and hardships of life are not universal, but we can forge connections with those different from us to come to a collective understanding of pain, of heart, of possibility.

“I’ve tried to bridge the gap between being like, we are both now sitting together in this car as we are both feeling sad,” Dixon explained. “I think being able to have a lot of we-us-I statements together and really keep them balanced sort of makes the record seem like this is not a story that I’m not in or a story that I’m super in, (but instead) it’s a story that we’re both in.”

This can be heard on “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?” The title, taken from three of Morrison’s most celebrated novels, is the first sign that Dixon is making a different kind of record. Forthright and expressive, “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?” is a fast-paced album that channels feelings of longing and escape. It is an ambitious record, too, with lush, hyper-layered instrumentation and a quirky spirit reminiscent of the recent past. As a listener, I’m transported to a nostalgic time a little less than 10 years ago, before life became inescapably complicated, as well as to earlier decades, far before I understood what I was listening to. Imbued with jazz and orchestral arrangements, “Beloved! Paradise! Jazz!?,” plainly speaking, is also quite beautiful.

Dixon wants listeners to feel held after listening to the record. “Like they were reading a book and it was going by too fast, but the pictures were pretty,” he said. It’s a sentiment he likens to reading one of Morrison’s novels.

“Maybe like small, little experiences in human existence, you know, and it’s like a bunch of moments again,” Dixon said. “I think that’s what I want for that. I want to be like, ‘Damn, I can knock this out quick, and now it’s my favorite because it was accessible.’”

Performing 8 p.m. Sept. 9 at Schubas Tavern, 3159 N. Southport Ave.; tickets $15-$17 (ages 18+) at lh-st.com

Britt Julious is a freelance critic.